I think I’m really addicted to dominator playstyle. Either that or some character concepts and costume choices are just more fun than others. I really like my new dom. And it helps that I’m in a just-starting SG and feel competitive enough to keep ahead of the pack in levels and prestige, so to speak. I feel like I’ve got the same bug as when I started leveling Invictus and Malentis.
I’m starting to eat, drink, sleep, dream CoV and itching for the next time I can get on and play Black Jeremiah a little more. Get a new power and see something cool happen. Get enough money for one more DO, etc.
And in having my thoughts turned to the game practically all the time, I really wonder as to the teaming difference between CoH and CoV.
It’s like as heroes, there’s a trust out there that everyone will do their jobs, perform their expected function, as well as they can. The jobs are also pretty clear cut. Of course, noobs who have alarming power set choices or just don’t get it will always be around, especially at the low levels. But I seem to enjoy the teaming synergy more in CoH, it’s something relied upon for years so the formula is known, and it’s something that seems more done in CoH.
In CoV, it seems like there’s a ‘coward’ sort of villainous mindset abounding. Not me first. You go. I don’t want to die. I’m squishy. My pets are squishy. Or at least a confusion as to the team roles. So we all stand around waiting for someone to take alpha (yo, brute. Or mm…) Or for someone to brave a pull (ouch, there’s a chance that all of them could come and shoot at me. No way, -you- pull…)
Makes it very hard to team.
Although…while typing this, it has occurred to me why I feel a difference between CoH and CoV. I usually play alpha-strike capable classes CoH-wise. I always lead in when I play a tank. If not, I start the fight with a corner pull. I’m pace-setting.
The warshade is now alpha-strike absorb-capable thanks to black dwarf. So yes, if I see people getting wishy washy, I just zot into the lobster and soak alpha. People follow blindly once they see someone start, and there’s always someone on the team who will never understand aggy and steal it – not hard from a dwarf. Then I get to double mire and zot to nova and end the fight.
CoV, I’m usually a dom. Ice is well…the slick is pretty, but I really hate the return strike, so I don’t soak alpha with it much. I do start combats with Frosty once I got him though. I’m not high level enough yet to use flashfire without flinching, but once I get it to SOs, I think I would open with it. Especially if I can get cinders slotted as a backup once the disorient wears off.
That said, I dunno. Even if I was playing a brute, I think I would be very nervous about alpha soaking. I feel squishier than a tank. Granted, I’m not high level enough to slot defences to round it out yet.
But I think I would resent aggro holding as a brute. I don’t think it’s in my job description to hold aggy or rescue anyone, it’s too…heroic. Whaddya think I am? A tank? I’m supposed to be a berserker. Concept-wise, it doesn’t jibe. Game-wise, from the squishy side of things, I LOVE a brute who would deign to hold aggro and make the effort to save a fellow villain, I worship the ground he walketh upon. Even if I personally don’t want the responsibility as one, that duty seems like the realm of tankhood…Brutes are supposed to just SMASH. Meh, maybe this internal conflict is why I can’t get a brute beyond level 8 and don’t dare to team him with anyone yet.
Perhaps it just takes one person to start and act responsibly and the rest will follow. Rare in CoV, yes. For example, last night, I stayed up well past my bedtime (3am, if you must know, and was caffeinated and awake and hyper lurking on boards and lying in bed until like 4-5am) to play on a great Pinnacle PUG team.
Why? 2 brutes who were tanking. No really, they were. Not as much as real tanks would, but they made an effort. I don’t know how they were doing it, I didn’t see them running any auras, I forgot to check if they had taunt, but they somehow always split the group up between them, went for the lts and bosses, and tried to whack into next week minions chasing after squishy hiney (either that or my constant running around and hopping over their heads escaping from minions chasing my hiney annoyed them.) And they knew when to let the ranged classes pull apart too big a spawn.
And because this effort was made, it was appreciated and reciprocated. I know I upped my intensity and gave it a larger effort than normal for a PUG. I incinerated stuff, took risks shooting fire breath and drawing aggro because I trusted the mobs would either die soon or get distracted by a brute. Lt and boss holding is always standard. Flashfire was thrown a lot more often – granted, +1s and +2s, so I dared to – to give some breathing room and temporary seconds of drunk punching bag to the brutes.
There was a classic incident that happened that really belongs to the hero side of the equation. Longbow base, two spawns clumped together, overaggro to the max. We fought really hard, got overwhelmed, I sucked up longbow aggy so bad, I had a milimeter’s sliver of red left on the health bar. I made an immediate retreat, of course.
On a bad PUG, I would be headlong into the elevators and out the front door by this point, cos I know everyone else would be breaking and running and on no account do I want to be the last person the angry mobs catch sight of. On this group, I backed off about two spawn length’s down the long wide corridor, still in player sight range of all that’s going on, and decided to risk resting. In full view of the furious combat. One brute had retreated at mid-hp, the other brute and dom were still holding back the tide.
The dom got hit bad, he turned and started running full tilt back toward me. In a split second, my thoughts went something like this: oh crap, he broke and ran, and here I am resting. Next second, the brute’s going to either turn and run or go down and I’m right in the tidal wave’s path. Crudddd x 10. Please don’t run, please don’t run, hold out juuuus a lil longer, I’m coming, almost there…
He didn’t. He held out, he ‘tanked’ for the crucial seconds I needed to get rest going. I don’t know if he even saw me in harm’s way and acted on that impulse, or if it was just tank instinct. I let rest zip up ever so slowly, watching tensely as the brute’s health bar dipped lower and lower as mine went up at the same pace.
3/4 of my health bar was back. Good enough. Undo rest, trigger domination (which was up, I just didn’t dare use it with like 5 hp remaining, death sentence for sure) and race madly toward the brute. Who had juuust broken and started to run with 1/5 of his hp left, in the red.
Char one lt, fire breath madly on minions to steal aggro from the dying brute, incinerate and hop around like a madman on stilts, char another lieutenant, flashfire the whole lot, got mebbe four of ‘em stunned, spam flares into what I can – singlehandedly, in domination, holding off 6 or more yellow and orange mobs to a standstill. Thanks to the CRUCIAL time to regain hp the brute bought me.
Beat up three mobs, had maybe 1/4 hp left at this point, two chain held, still dancing wildly around the last, when the brute, then the rest of the team came back to help clean up. I, in turn, had bought them enough time to recover.
Very nice feeling of cooperation going on there. Icing on the cake, I leveled on the second last mob as we were cleaning up.
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